SURF Research Day 2024

The benefits of making research data available for reuse are recognized by many. While some datasets can be openly available, others contain sensitive or personal data limiting the reuse to certain conditions. Many repositories, including the DANS Data Stations, provide options to publish datasets under restricted access: Before a user can access the data, they have to submit a request that the data owner evaluates. While this offers a great potential to facilitate reuse, information about the access procedures and requirements are often not included in the data description. It can be difficult for a user to assess whether they are eligible for data reuse and what is required of them. The requirements data owners apply vary and may include requests for motivations, or limitations on the purpose of reuse. Some data owners also limit the reuse to particular institutions. Standardised ways of describing the requirements and process for data access are currently lacking. To improve the transparency of the data access procedures, we have been working on guidelines for depositing restricted access. We also created a Data Access Protocol template that allows a standardized way to specify data access procedures and requirements. In this Pecha Kucha presentation, we want to present our approach to access procedures for sensitive data. We hope to inspire the adoption of a more structured description of data access procedures to enhance the ‘A’ of FAIR: providing the exact conditions under which the data are accessible.”